Enc spell hate too much?

[Slayn]

I have read several guides on archived castersrealm websites and allakhazam websites that have detailed comments from players on soloing strategies and techniques. Many of these comments provide hints about how much threat is generated from certain spells. For instance, many of these guides begin with the enchanter opening with spells like tash and choke, followed by the enc pet immediately gaining aggro after the enc is hit by damage.

On project 1999, this is hardly the case. If I open with tash (the lowest hate-building enc spell at the moment it seems), it normally takes my pet at least 2 taunts and/or 50 damage to gain aggro. If I open with choke, the mob will beat on me it's entire life unless I root or whirl it. Additionally, any debuffs like incapacitate or mesmerize will cause a mob to beat on me until it is dead even if my pet or group does 100% of the damage dealt.

In classic, I played an Enchanter through Velious and into Luclin, and the only spell that ever caused this much hate was charm. In project 1999, it seems that the hate generated by charm is one of the lowest hate generating spells there is. While spells like these did generate a large amount of hate in classic, Project 1999's numbers seem to be a bit off.

Some might say that the hate generated by these spells are the same as in classic, however, through research of classic-era posts from many different users, and from personal experience, I am convinced that something is not right. If Enchanter spells are working correctly, then something else is not functioning correctly such as threat generated by malee damage and/or taunt.

- Slayn, 19 Enchanter

[Shin Noir]

Yeah, I have a feeling that debuffs and DD's are doing too much hate, and stuns/blinds not doing enough sort of thing. But it's really tough to isolate what is really needed!

[Danth]

I made a thread on Flash of Light which correlates to the observation here: that spell hate generated by spells such as that are far lower than it ought to be relative to other spell types (such as direct damage spells, debuffs, heals, etc).

Notably, a Shadow Knight's Disease Cloud works about like I remember (gigantic, un-matched threat), so perhaps the fact that it works has to do with it having a damage component.

Danth

[takatok]

Our standard play group is mage, mage, druid , enchanter. I can also tell that enchanter spells are enormous aggro compared to anyone else and noticiably worse than live. I think this has to do with the way EQEMU handles aggro for spells.

N.B. The following is assuming that '99 sitll has the same aggro code as stock EqEmu.

The way the server handles aggro is it checks every type of aggro a spell might have... Dmg, ac debuff, str debuff, sta debuff, and so on. Each one of these has a number associated with it that is spell specific (technically that number runs through a formula.. but the final result is a set amount of aggro). Now each spell can be tweaked so the aggro from one spell's ac debuff is less than another spells debuff.

However, if the Database person isn't aware of how the code works looks at other spells to see how a paticular spell should be coded in or just doesn't realize the effects are cumulative some problems can creep in. Say Spell A only stuns and has 100 aggro. Spell B is only an AC debuff and has 80 aggro. Enchanter Spell C... stuns AND ac debuffs ends up having 180 if htey just copy the numbers from the last 2 spells. Since most chanter spells end up having multple components to them (stun, stat debuffs as well as dot or DD), I think this is where the super high aggro is coming from. I think a sample just from level 1-24 spells of enchanters would show after calculating all the aggro number they are indeed clocking in too high.

There might end up being problems later on with shaman/mage spell lines of malo.. unless they were caught in a beta test and tweaked already. Though it could just be the small stun all the chanter spells tend to have is whats wrecking them since stun on other spells generally is high aggro intentionally.

Bapo 23 Mage

P.S On a different note.. I find it interesting that the slow leveling + forcing to use original gear is highlighting a lot of oddities in the code. I suspect on most of the EQemu servers.. small differences in aggro between casters is barely even noticed.. While small imbalances on 99 become glaringly huge. It seems Classic takes a much finer tuning to work right. Kudos for all the mechanics that already are working quite well.

[Slayn]

After more spell testing I can roughly categorize the current spell hate vs. old spell hate generated:

Current Spell Hate:

High
---------------------------------
Mesmerize
Enfeeble

Medium
---------------------------------
Weakness
Chaos Flux/Sanity Warp
Languid Pace
Tashan
Color Flux
Root

Low
---------------------------------
Charm


Classic Spell Hate:

High
---------------------------------
Charm
Sanity Warp

Medium
---------------------------------
Mesmerize
Weakness
Incapacitate
Languid Pace
Tashan

Low
---------------------------------
Root
Color Flux

[SirSpankAlot360]

Yes Slayn, that is correct. While mesmerize and enfeeble were supposed to generate a bit of aggro in classic, tanks were supposed to be able to taunt a mesmerized mob and then attack it to gain aggro off of the enchanter. I believe there are some issues with taunt though... maybe not broken but definitely not up to par with where it should be.

[Wenai]

I made a thread on Flash of Light which correlates to the observation here: that spell hate generated by spells such as that are far lower than it ought to be relative to other spell types (such as direct damage spells, debuffs, heals, etc).

Notably, a Shadow Knight's Disease Cloud works about like I remember (gigantic, un-matched threat), so perhaps the fact that it works has to do with it having a damage component.

Danth
I had a SHD twink that I leveled to 50. I remember Disease Cloud working crazily good. So I sat down with Nilbog one afternoon and we manually changed the amount of hate associated with Disease cloud to try and make it feel right.

[Gaaaaavin]

Having started an enchanter alt, I've noticed a bit of this, too. I gained aggro way more easily than others in my group. I noticed something else that I thought was a bit odd. I'm not sure how this was in classic, as I never had an enchanter then, but I was not only gaining a ton of aggro from spells, but I was gaining aggro from spell RESISTS.

I cast my choke spell on a mob and had it resisted, so I cast again. The spell was again resisted. However, at this point, with me having done no damage at all to the mob (nor having debuffed, mezed, hit it with anything!) the mob turned on me and attacked... and it took several rounds for the group to pull aggro away. And all this with me having done NOTHING to harm the mob.

This seemed more than a bit odd. Addmitedly, this was a low level EC orc group so I don't know if this happens at highter levels, but it seemed quite odd to gain aggro from two resisted spells.

[Durden]

I had a SHD twink that I leveled to 50. I remember Disease Cloud working crazily good. So I sat down with Nilbog one afternoon and we manually changed the amount of hate associated with Disease cloud to try and make it feel right.

I have to agree with the idea that there is something in the code that adds the two distinct hates for multiple effects caused by one spell together as if it were two different spells without mitigating it at all (because it's coming from one cast and not two). For what it's worth, a mage and I could burn through red gnoll reavers easily in EK if I (shaman) simply pulled with a Poison DoT and kited the mob in circles around the mage - his fire pet (taunt off) attacking all the while and him nuking it down. I realize that the DoT is supposed to generate massive hate via an initial damage DD as well as a DoT component that lingers - and this definitely makes a difference, as a resist would lead to me losing the mob's attention rather quickly - but it seems odd that a mob would continue to put me #1 on its hate list when the mage ended up doing ~80% of the total damage needed to kill it. I realize that this damage is split between the pet and the mage, but both have easily outdamaged me by the time the mob is near or under 40% health, and it still won't even glance at them.

As far as what Wenai said, yes, SK hate generation is basically the shit, but iirc it was that way on live as well (to some extent). I have to wait a good few seconds to cast anything on a mob when a warrior is attacking/taunting, but I can basically unload if I want the second the SK lands one spell and not worry about drawing the mob off him at all. I've grouped with quite a few SKs who stress having someone else pull so they can med in between mobs, and if pays off because the mobs that come in end up sticking to the SK like glue, but that was why people desired SKs as tank on live - whatever adjustments you and Nilbog made to spells like Disease Cloud seem pretty accurate, Wenai.

[stormlord]

Our standard play group is mage, mage, druid , enchanter. I can also tell that enchanter spells are enormous aggro compared to anyone else and noticiably worse than live. I think this has to do with the way EQEMU handles aggro for spells.

N.B. The following is assuming that '99 sitll has the same aggro code as stock EqEmu.

The way the server handles aggro is it checks every type of aggro a spell might have... Dmg, ac debuff, str debuff, sta debuff, and so on. Each one of these has a number associated with it that is spell specific (technically that number runs through a formula.. but the final result is a set amount of aggro). Now each spell can be tweaked so the aggro from one spell's ac debuff is less than another spells debuff.

However, if the Database person isn't aware of how the code works looks at other spells to see how a paticular spell should be coded in or just doesn't realize the effects are cumulative some problems can creep in. Say Spell A only stuns and has 100 aggro. Spell B is only an AC debuff and has 80 aggro. Enchanter Spell C... stuns AND ac debuffs ends up having 180 if htey just copy the numbers from the last 2 spells. Since most chanter spells end up having multple components to them (stun, stat debuffs as well as dot or DD), I think this is where the super high aggro is coming from. I think a sample just from level 1-24 spells of enchanters would show after calculating all the aggro number they are indeed clocking in too high.

There might end up being problems later on with shaman/mage spell lines of malo.. unless they were caught in a beta test and tweaked already. Though it could just be the small stun all the chanter spells tend to have is whats wrecking them since stun on other spells generally is high aggro intentionally.

Bapo 23 Mage

P.S On a different note.. I find it interesting that the slow leveling + forcing to use original gear is highlighting a lot of oddities in the code. I suspect on most of the EQemu servers.. small differences in aggro between casters is barely even noticed.. While small imbalances on 99 become glaringly huge. It seems Classic takes a much finer tuning to work right. Kudos for all the mechanics that already are working quite well.

Get a warrior or other melee in there to taunt and/or keep aggro off you. Get a well balanced group.

I don't mean to sounds mean, but you shouldn't change classic to fit your opinion of how groups should work.

Btw, mages are already buff. Don't complain too much. Just some advice.

[stormlord]

I have read several guides on archived castersrealm websites and allakhazam websites that have detailed comments from players on soloing strategies and techniques. Many of these comments provide hints about how much threat is generated from certain spells. For instance, many of these guides begin with the enchanter opening with spells like tash and choke, followed by the enc pet immediately gaining aggro after the enc is hit by damage.

On project 1999, this is hardly the case. If I open with tash (the lowest hate-building enc spell at the moment it seems), it normally takes my pet at least 2 taunts and/or 50 damage to gain aggro. If I open with choke, the mob will beat on me it's entire life unless I root or whirl it. Additionally, any debuffs like incapacitate or mesmerize will cause a mob to beat on me until it is dead even if my pet or group does 100% of the damage dealt.

In classic, I played an Enchanter through Velious and into Luclin, and the only spell that ever caused this much hate was charm. In project 1999, it seems that the hate generated by charm is one of the lowest hate generating spells there is. While spells like these did generate a large amount of hate in classic, Project 1999's numbers seem to be a bit off.

Some might say that the hate generated by these spells are the same as in classic, however, through research of classic-era posts from many different users, and from personal experience, I am convinced that something is not right. If Enchanter spells are working correctly, then something else is not functioning correctly such as threat generated by malee damage and/or taunt.

- Slayn, 19 Enchanter

Maybe you got a point, but there's so much complaining alongside legitimate bugs that it's hard to tell the differnece. Many many people use the term "bug" too liberally, to complain about an aspect of the game they don't like.

Mes isn't just a debuff. Once you cast it, you should "dazzle" them so they don't come on you. Otherwise, casting mes on mobs will aggro them on you once they come out of it (this is how it works anyway in the classic mm's). (this is modern eq) I been in a lot of mm's where the chanter messes htem and then gets raped because he didn't dazzle em (prolly mess'd himself tho cuz he's too close).

[guineapig]

While I agree that you should always memory blur a mezzed mob when in a group or at least root it if it's not a caster, agro is way off where it should be. Some of the spells do seem mixed up a bit, but in general if you ever played chanter before you should expect to be the most hated member of the team most of the time.

That being said, it is manageable once you get the timing of the group down. I for one wait a bit longer before I tash/slow or tash/debuff when I have a Warrior tank then when I have an SK or Paly tank and that's pretty much the way I have always done it.

With an SK tank I can pretty much start casting at 98%, with a Paly I would say start casting at 95%, with a warrior wait till 90%. Of course that depends on what you are casting and how fast you cast a follow up spell.

[Takon]

Having started an enchanter alt, I've noticed a bit of this, too. I gained aggro way more easily than others in my group. I noticed something else that I thought was a bit odd. I'm not sure how this was in classic, as I never had an enchanter then, but I was not only gaining a ton of aggro from spells, but I was gaining aggro from spell RESISTS.

I cast my choke spell on a mob and had it resisted, so I cast again. The spell was again resisted. However, at this point, with me having done no damage at all to the mob (nor having debuffed, mezed, hit it with anything!) the mob turned on me and attacked... and it took several rounds for the group to pull aggro away. And all this with me having done NOTHING to harm the mob.

This seemed more than a bit odd. Addmitedly, this was a low level EC orc group so I don't know if this happens at highter levels, but it seemed quite odd to gain aggro from two resisted spells.

Playing a wiz on '99 and having played one up through lvl 70 or some shit on live, my experience shows this working as normal. I actually think resists generate more agro than damaged nukes, through several years of testing.

[Zinyen]

Playing a wiz on '99 and having played one up through lvl 70 or some shit on live, my experience shows this working as normal. I actually think resists generate more agro than damaged nukes, through several years of testing.

Yes. Resists caused more hate in classic EQ than the normal spell. Also, Enc spells like Chaotic Feedback were incredible threat, and back then we always assumed it was because of the damage+stun component it had. I remember dreading chaotic feedback being resisted, because it was going to be such high threat.

[Gaaaaavin]

Yes. Resists caused more hate in classic EQ than the normal spell. Also, Enc spells like Chaotic Feedback were incredible threat, and back then we always assumed it was because of the damage+stun component it had. I remember dreading chaotic feedback being resisted, because it was going to be such high threat.

That's good to know, thanks! Like I said, I never played any pure casters beyond the first few levels back in classic. This is good to know for the future. Thanks!

[Samuel]

Does anyone remember how much hate the Malo line of spells caused in classic? I didn't play a shaman in classic (played a druid and warrior) so I can't comment. However, I spent a lot of time as a shaman after velious and the malo line of spells caused a very small amount of hate. On this server malo causes a LOT of hate (which may be correct, as I said I don't know).

[argamath]

Tash line is not enough aggro, other enchanter spells are too much aggro. Much different than live.

[messiah_b]

Get a warrior or other melee in there to taunt and/or keep aggro off you. Get a well balanced group.

I don't mean to sounds mean, but you shouldn't change classic to fit your opinion of how groups should work.



My nightly group is war - cle - enc - necro - monk - dru all in the 10-12 range.

After mez nothing any of us do will pull that mob of an enchanter. Chanter has to root or tank it usually till it's dead although there have been a few cases where it turns around at a melee when it's under 10%.

upside: it does make for a nice yakkity sax moment every time we break mez and the enchanter is running in circles followed by mob followed by ogre/human/skele

[guineapig]

My nightly group is war - cle - enc - necro - monk - dru all in the 10-12 range.

After mez nothing any of us do will pull that mob of an enchanter. Chanter has to root or tank it usually till it's dead although there have been a few cases where it turns around at a melee when it's under 10%.

upside: it does make for a nice yakkity sax moment every time we break mez and the enchanter is running in circles followed by mob followed by ogre/human/skele

Not belittling the issue but this might help for now. Root the mob a good 10-15 seconds after mez so when it wakes up it simply can't chase after you. (If I recall your current mez has about a 24 second duration, right?

When mez breaks make sure you are standing, sitting will just put you higher on the hate list.

The tank should taunt right before breaking mez. THIS IS KEY. Taunt makes the tanks hate increase to the current highest +1. If taunt is successful and the tank then bashes, kicks or whatever to break mez (instead of waiting for it to end) and you are standing, then there is no way that the mob should go after you. (he has to break mez right after the successful taunt or else you risk having the mob run it's mez/break check, at which time you get bumped back up to the top of the hate list.)

It sounds like a lot of steps but once you get a good rhythm you can start leaving out the part about rooting as it's not necessary. The rest really only takes a second.

(P.S. If your tank is a paly or SK just have them use stun/hate spell respectively. those actually work much better than taunt.)

[Smashed]

Another thing to consider is the terribly high aggro on these spells is only disguised to the rest of the group members by the fact that whirl till you hurl is so powerful. But considering the people playing enc on this server, I doubt the people in charge will let anything bad happen to the class?

[Elerion]

The descriptions in this thread match how it worked in Live pretty well.

Tash was always high hate for such a "small" spell. Many times higher than for the Malo line. The general consensus in the chanter community back then was that this was due to it adding poison counters, which causes significant additional hate. See Disease Cloud (disease counter, but similar hate effect). This is a major reason why shamans were preferred slowers - they could consistently land their slow much sooner, while enchanters had to gamble on a non-tash slow or wait until the tank had built heavy aggro before they could tash.

Enchanter nuke line was always massive hate compared to similar spells by other casters. This is due to it doing a stun effect, which is massive hate. See paladin low level stuns, and how they were used to create unbeatable hate during PoP. Somewhere around PoP the stun was removed from the later enchanter nukes to counter this effect.

Charm was always very high hate, as we all know.

Mesmerize was always very significant hate. There are two reasons why this may have been disguised to you in the past.
First off, later mezzes have significant chances to memblur the mob (30%). Classic mezzes only have a 1% chance to do this, which gives them an illusion of being higher hate.
Second, back in the day most competent tanks knew that you should taunt mezzed mobs until it landed (Noted by the 'I'll teach you to interfere with me' line if the mob can speak), which would put them above the enchanter regardless of how much hate the enchanter had amassed (ignoring hate bonus technicalities). If your tank isn't landing taunt or using massive aggro spells like disease cloud/stuns, you will find a mob that has been mezzed multiple times will be very hard to peel.

[Zallarenya]

I usually hate to rez very old threads, but rezzing an old one is better than creating a duplicate.

In my (limited, level 13) experience, the Choke line generates greater threat than anything else -- way more than it should. Sometimes I can wait until a mob is 50% dead before I engage it with Choke, and I end up tanking it the rest of the fight.

[mmiles8]

One thing to consider that's often forgotten, is that your level of HP (current value, not percentage of max) plays a very large role in whether or not you get aggro. Being grouped with a cleric who symbols the tank and no one else, a very well geared tank with twice as many hp as you, or simply having crap for HP yourself, etc. Large disparities will cause an aggro gap. I've said this numerous times in numerous threads, and most have found this knowledge to be helpful. Any time you're experiencing threat issues regardless of how late into a fight you cast your spell on the mob, either ask the tank to click off his HP buff, or go get a better one yourself.

[BeelzeBob]

I usually hate to rez very old threads, but rezzing an old one is better than creating a duplicate.

In my (limited, level 13) experience, the Choke line generates greater threat than anything else -- way more than it should. Sometimes I can wait until a mob is 50% dead before I engage it with Choke, and I end up tanking it the rest of the fight.

Enchanter animation pets never tanked past gaining the choke spell on live, the only way to solo with the animation is to snare kite and nuke, while the pet hacks away. If you want to play enchanter like a pet class learn to charm.

[Reiker]

One thing to consider that's often forgotten, is that your level of HP (current value, not percentage of max) plays a very large role in whether or not you get aggro. Being grouped with a cleric who symbols the tank and no one else, a very well geared tank with twice as many hp as you, or simply having crap for HP yourself, etc. Large disparities will cause an aggro gap. I've said this numerous times in numerous threads, and most have found this knowledge to be helpful. Any time you're experiencing threat issues regardless of how late into a fight you cast your spell on the mob, either ask the tank to click off his HP buff, or go get a better one yourself.

lol

[mmiles8]

lol

When you find a break in posting one line trolls (http://www.project1999.org/forums/search.php?do=finduser&u=204), test it yourself :D

[Zallarenya]

Enchanter animation pets never tanked past gaining the choke spell on live, the only way to solo with the animation is to snare kite and nuke, while the pet hacks away. If you want to play enchanter like a pet class learn to charm.

I'm talking about full groups, not soloing.

One thing to consider that's often forgotten, is that your level of HP (current value, not percentage of max) plays a very large role in whether or not you get aggro. Being grouped with a cleric who symbols the tank and no one else, a very well geared tank with twice as many hp as you, or simply having crap for HP yourself, etc. Large disparities will cause an aggro gap. I've said this numerous times in numerous threads, and most have found this knowledge to be helpful. Any time you're experiencing threat issues regardless of how late into a fight you cast your spell on the mob, either ask the tank to click off his HP buff, or go get a better one yourself.
I don't think this explains it. This was a low-level, non-twink, brand new toons group; we all had the same HP buffs - Pally Courage, Druid Skin. There wasn't much of a HP disparity.

If the difference in HP of naked enchanter and naked paladin who is a level below is great enough to cause this, it seems a little broken. I certainly don't remember having this problem on Live. Admittedly I didn't play Classic, only Kunark+. If it really was like this before Kunark, nothing to see here!

[mmiles8]

My intent wasn't to detract from your statement regarding the threat from the spell. Just throwing you some info to help.

[ryandward]

This thread is definitely not just QQing, I basically have quit my chanter because of spells generating far too much hate.

[Merrik]

I tend to agree here, I specifically remember Tash and mez spells generating a ton of agro, and maybe it was because i didn't do a lot of DOTing mobs as a chanter back on live, but choke just seems to be stupid agro. I always remember slows being a pretty heavy agro builder, but on p99 I can pull with slow and the mob can be off of me after two hits of a pet, doesn't matter if taunt goes off or not. But god forbid I cast a dot that ticks for 12 damage (yes I know it debuffs too) because the mob suddenly thinks I'm the anti-christ and wants to rape my ass. Even if I body pull a mob and my pet jumps on it immediatly, I can do nothing to the mob until my pet has it to 50%, choke the mob and i have to tank the rest of the fight, since its a guarantee that if I see "soandso hits you for 1 point of damage" I will be interrupted.

I duo with my brothers necro though, so to be honest it's really not that big of a deal since I almost always root mobs so i can take a hit and get my pet on it anyway.

[tulsplat]

On live back in the day, I remember sometimes enchanters would be called to "Tashicide" a raid mob, since tash was so much aggro they would die after casting it

[azeth]

because the mob suddenly thinks I'm the anti-christ and wants to rape my ass.

south park reference? Satan was the receiver after all..

[aVoided]

Couldn't agree more. I played chanter on live. and never was a single mez a death sentence ever.... Even my lame dot is a death sentance... seems everything I do is a death sentence on this class on this server... oh and mem blurr is brok 50% of the time too.. if not more.

[rsjr]

On Live healers would sometimes get heal aggro if the fight went on for a bit and a mob was mezzed a few times. That's how little aggro mez generated. Compared to P1999 it's night and day. I don't know what other class on here plays as differently as enchanters, from charm not working at lower levels to being way too good at the high end to the aggro on our spells being completely different.

It's not unplayable, it's not even that difficult to deal with (charm being good makes us a little overpowered), it's just not classic.

Charm, Tash, Chaotic Feedback type nuke line needs aggro increased. It's way too low.

DoT line, mez, AE stuns (color line) needs aggro reduced. Mez and AE stun especially. AE stun did almost no aggro on live and mez only a bit more.

[mmiles8]

I tried to recruit some folks to do some testing and get some data the devs could work with.

It's as hard for the devs to work on the issue without data as it is to test threat with one person.

http://www.project1999.org/forums/showthread.php?t=11961

Still looking for volunteers btw.

[azeth]

On live back in the day, I remember sometimes enchanters would be called to "Tashicide" a raid mob, since tash was so much aggro they would die after casting it

Usually the tashicide occurred before the mob was even engaged. I'm not disputing it's a lot of aggro, but the reason they died was because they were the only person to attack the mob.